Norvic Philatelics - GB New Stamps and Special Postmarks

'Jane Eyre' by Charlotte Bronte - 24 February 2005

To commemorate World Book Day and the 150th anniversary of the death of
Charlotte Bronte Royal Mail has gone overboard with a set of 6 stamps, a
miniature sheet and a prestige book.

As is often the case, Royal Mail has trouble relating the chronology of
the designs to the values, and there is no logic to the order of the
stamps in the set, apart from having the principle characters on the two
most used inland rate stamps.

40p 'In the Comfort of her Bonnet' - Jane arrives at the
George Inn and is beset with doubt and fears

Miniature sheet The miniature sheet has all 6
stamps on a background of the title page of the Jane Eyre
manuscript. Pictured at proof stage: we cannot be sure
which of these shows the correct colours

57p 'La Ligne des Rats' - Adele Rochester recites
to Jane

68p 'Refectory' - Jane is subjected to a starvation diet
at Lowton School

£1.12 'Inspection' - Rev Brocklehurst, the sadistic head
of Lowton School

Prestige Book: The Bronte Sisters

The panes are shown here on our first day covers (These covers are
sold out).
Pane 1: as shown below, contains Machin 2nd class, 39p & 42p
stamps with a label showing the marking of the Bronte Museum. The page
illustration shows Howarth Parsonage 1860.
Pane 2: This pane is illustrated with a letter written by Charlotte
Bronte (now in the British Museum) and has 2 x 2nd class and 2 x 40p
England stamps.

Pane 3 (below): a block containing 2 x 1st class and 2 x 2nd class
'Jane Eyre' stamps, with an illustration of the title page of the manuscript
of Jane Eyre.
Pane 4: a block containing the other 4 stamps of the 'Jane Eyre' set.
(No idea of the crowd scene depicted here.)

Technical details:
The stamps, Miniature Sheet and Prestige Book are all printed by Walsall
Security Printers in lithography, except the panes of defintive and
country stamps which are printed in gravure.

All images are taken from Royal Mail's Philatelic
Bulletin and Postmark Bulletin, and are Copyright 2004/5
by Royal Mail.

Norvic Exclusive First Day Covers

We have produced exclusive FDCs for this issue for the set and the
miniature sheet - shown below,
and in sets of 4 prestige book panes - see above.

Norvic FDC with set of 6 stamps and postmark N9424 or N9444 - £7.50

Norvic FDC with miniature sheet and postmark N9421 or N9441 - £7.50
Prestige book on a set of 4 Norvic FDCs with postmarks N9424, L9437,
N9420, N9423 (Panes 1-4) -
Sold out (see above).